Expanding GIS Education through Methodology:
The Case of a User Oriented Operations Taxonmy
Micha Pazner
The University of Western Ontario, London, Canada
This paper presents the rationale for a use or application-oriented, rather
than a functional or a structural grouping of the spatial image processing
operations found in grid-based geographic information systems (GIS). These
operations process remote sensing, cartographic, and field data organized
in pixel, image, and image stack form. Sixteen common types of spatial
image processing operations are organized in four groups, using a combined
simplicity-and-usefulness criteria. The proposed grouping is first and
foremost a teaching methodology which can also be regarded as a
classification or taxonomy of spatial image processing operations.
Following a brief background, the paper presents and explains the applied
taxonomy. The paper ends with a discussion of implications and
applications of the applied organizational framework for spatial image
processing operations. Insights were acquired by teaching students using
an earlier prototype of the proposed grouping. It is concluded that the
manner by which operations are organized into groups profoundly affects
their learning and use.
Micha Pazner, Associate Professor and Director
The UWO GIS Laboratory
Department of Geography
Social Science Centre
The University of Western Ontario
London, ON, Canada N6A 5C2
Tel: 519-661-2111 ext. 4501 or 5031 (msgs)
Fax: 519-661-3750
e-mail: pazner@sscl.uwo.ca